Tiny Coffins

"If you sit around long enough, you'll get depressed about anything..."

Not to say that I am. Definitely not.

I was just thinking about the children's hospital today. I was there back in January for a stomach illness, and in February for some stitching to my face. I was thinking about how I sat there all night just to get in and be examined. I needed to make sure I didn't have appendicitis or something wrong with me. Surprisingly, tests and x-rays just turned up inconclusive. I didn't know if there was an actual name to the illness I had. To this day I still don't know. While that disturbs me, something more disturbed me while I was sitting there for hours and hours clenching my stomach.

I looked at the walls, decorated with happy-go-lucky paintings of things smiling and flowers and happy things all around. There was Curious George playing on the television. The Incredibles. Then the Land Before Time. All happy.

But I couldn't get past the idea that floors above me in the same building held sick kids who were suffering way more than me. Kids younger and older than me. Crying out in pain that was worse than mine and tore their insides. Cancer eating away at their organs. Tumors growing. Hearts with arrhythmia. Organs that needed to be removed and replaced. Brains that needed fixing. Kids who were hooked up to machines to prolong their life. Masks covering their mouths. Countless IVs. Kids who were there for psychiatric reasons. Suicide. Anxiety disorder. Whatever. Kids who might have never experienced the joy of the outside world to its fullest. Who never went to a Habs game. Who never snowboarded on the slopes at high-speeds (hitting trees). Who never went to concerts. Who missed tons of school. Who maybe didn't have any friends that would visit them daily. Or no friends at all.

I sat in the waiting room that night disgusted with my reasoning for being there that night. I didn't deserve treatment or examinations or the red card they gave me or the bracelet or even my medicare card. I didn't deserve it. I sat there with a stomach ache like a whiny spoiled bitch.

I don't ever want to go back there. I can't be in a building surrounded by kids who have tiny coffins destined for them.

-J